I don’t remember at the moment where I read this but it is a brilliant retort to the “almost all the Founders were Christians” nonsense. “Yes, and almost all the Founders wore powdered wigs but that doesn’t mean that our nation was founded on powdered wigs.”
Republicans pander to the preachers while viewing human decency as a character flaw, all of it unencumbered by the thought process. Left up to these politicians America's public libraries would be reduced to the intellectual depth of a Christian bookstore.
The patriarch of my mother's extended family once entered our home (for some reason.)
He was actually offended by walls of books on bookshelves. According to him, there's only need for ONE BOOK in any home. (And as I've mentioned before, our contractor did NOT like our copy of Ambrose Bierce's The Devil's Dictionary.)
I have two rooms whose primary purpose is for books. Plus there are full bookshelves in three other rooms. The one book he would prefer to be the only book in the home? I can lay my hands on at least 7 copies in several translations in two languages within five minutes at home. Along with several books that he would consider demonic. And likely many that would be above his reading level.
Same here. Unlike these idiots, I actually read the bible, the whole thing, including Apocrypha--three times, in three different English translations, and most of the OT in a Modern Hebrew translation. I've got two of those English translations on my hallway bookshelves now. Plus a whole boatload of kids' books I read to my nephew when he was little. (Yeah, above comprehension level for most of these morons.) I often joke that, if the world goes nuclear, my personal library could contribute to the rebuilding of civilization.
I hope you're right, and something good will remain to build from, Diane.
I can still remember Dad reading the classics to us when we were little.
Thank you for the memory, Dianne. I lost both parents (to age and dementia, at home) during Covid, and I appreciate being reminded of them more than you may realize.
Nice memories. When I was in the hospital, at the age of two, my dad would come visit every day and bring a kids' book to read (sometimes in French, sometimes in English.) I credit him with keeping me sane in the year after getting out of the hospital by reading to me, and for being the first person to realize that, although I wasn't talking (my therapist later called that "traumatic mutism"), I was reading on my own. For all his faults, I miss dad, who died in 2007. Thanks for sharing your memories also.
My godson turned 12 on Saturday, the very time I turned 76. I gave him a card filled with advice to guide him for the rest of his life. Number four was: “never stop reading and learning.”
His dads would not let him have coffee until he’s 18 I’m sure. He’s a bit on the spectrum. Very smart kid. But he’s different. I don’t mind it. I was different too.
My g/son is 10yo, his parents have always restricted screen time and his free time is nicely filled with other hobbies.....to say he's an avid reader is an understatement. I took him to a vintage motor bike show recently. Owners stood proudly by their vehicles and more than one, pleasantly engaging him in conversation, said things like, 'My, my, it's a long time since I saw a lad your age with a book tucked under his arm, a rare sight indeed.' (G/son was itching to start the new Percy Jackson he'd just been given!)
One of the things I loved about owning my own house was that I could finally have all the books I wanted. After about two years, the house was filled with overflowing bookcases. (It wasn't a huge house, but I loved it.)
WOW! Kudos, Joe!! Fer shur, reading is FUNdamental!!
I still buy, but read less. (I feel I abandon my principles if I don't check a news feed every 3 minutes.) When I was a kid I can remember reading up to 400 pages "in bed" before rising for the day.
I even have the first 2 volumes of a 3-volume 1823 UK Bible, with dozens of genuine engravings in each (as evidenced by plate marks on the reverse of each.) Estimated value of $5,000. (I paid about $25 at a rural auction. Religion has value!)
Unfortunately, the missing 3rd volume (New Testament) is the only one I have a personal interest in. I really do value the Sermon On the Mount, and I think Jesus meant it as well. It breaks my heart to see Christians(sic) (as I thought of myself as a child) abandon it so thoroughly.
Reminds me one-time of when my MIL came to my house and they saw 2 books "The Devil's Dictionary" and "The Encyclopedia Of Witchcraft & Demonology" and thought they were literal witchcraft or Satanist books, and I asked her why she would think that based on the title and she could literally just open them up and check, before explaining that they are in fact either just informational or slight satire. She felt a bit dumb after that.
I remember a guy I was dating - very briefly, I might add - who walked into my living room, saw my collection of books on women's history, literature, feminism, the occult, history of witchcraft and paganism, etc., and burst out "Good god, you don't actually read all this crap, do you?"
After I recovered from the shock of the blatant uncouth rudeness (you do NOT walk into someone's home and criticize ANYTHING about it. Where I come from, that is Simply. Not. Done.) I replied flatly, "Of course not. They're just for decoration."
The sarcasm in my voice soared over his head like 747. "Oh thank goodness!"
As he was leaving, he added, "I feel sorry for you, living in this dingy little hole."
It was a studio apartment with hardwood floors and 6-foot tall windows. Small, yes, but it was not dingy, it was spotless. And it was most definitely NOT a hole.
This same guy was shocked, SHOCKED the next time he called and I told him I didn't think we were right for each other and I was dating someone else. He kept asking me to explain why. I told him to go read a book and hung up.
That's hilarious. Something similar happens to me, every time someone new comes into my one-bedroom apartment, whether it's the repair guy or friends or family I haven't seen in a while. They look around and the first thing out of their mouth is, "Don't you have anything here except *books*?" Some follow up with "Where's your tv?" My answers are, "No" and "I got rid of it because I'd watched it twice since 2009." Fun to stump 'em, but it does get boring after a while.
I bet it's the Bible, right? The Bible no one for the most part reads entirely, but reads only some passages and verses that suits them and nothing else.
There was a huge number of white southern sharecroppers, barely surviving from year to year.
Like now, they bought into lies about how necessary slavery, and our Civil War, were. My own southern heritage is composed of exactly such people, with no evidence of slavery anywhere within this county. Yet, to this day, other than my immediate family (now deceased), they are one and all useless, sad and ignorant MAGA.
I can’t say that I actually know any MAGA people. I know a couple of Republicans, and a coupleof the sons of my oldest friend in the world are Republicans. One of them supports Trump, but I’m not even sure about that anymore.
It isn’t a question of politics as I’ve often said. It is a question of values
I'd guess that what they find more offensive is the thinking that goes on behind the scenes in a child's mind as they read.
To MAGA, written language (and related images) are like some "secret code" invented specifically to steal children. (We've all heard crazier lately...)
I can't remember how old I was (9?) when I came across this story (it was in the school library of all places) set in a small American settlement in colonial times, when a young boy was caught reading a book that was not the Bible. He was promptly marched home to his parents by a committee of black-coated town elders who berated his parents about the offense. I don't remember much about it except that one of the things said was "the Good Book is the only book a household needs."
I remember thinking how horridly shitty and awful and boring it would be to live in a place where that was the only book you could own or read.
We also have to remember that they aren't doing this performance for us. They are doing it for their voters and people that are low info within the MAGA bubble. People who also don't read books or won't put any effort in to make sure the information they are getting is in good faith or honest.
We generally can't know if they're ACTUALLY stupid, or they're simply being performatively so (as it becomes increasingly difficult to "out-stupid" President Stupid.)
That’s the point. The one part of human nature they actually get right is our persistence hunting. We wear our prey out to make it easier to kill. The RWNJs have tapped into that persistence to defeat reasonable people. It is how they got Roe v. Wade, it’s how they keep winning elections despite being responsible for the majority of the problems folks want to fix, and it’s how they are fighting the culture wars. Constant, persistent attacks from every angle, small battles in local government, the middle ground at the states and just the barrage of lies and manipulations from the top brass in federal government. Just to keep the left exhausted, unable to fight every battle, unable to show up in their lives and fight the good fight at the same time.
They know that there is no constitutional way to make these two books illegal, but they will write a law anyway, because they already have the librarians on defense, they can make the law and it will be effective while the library fights it in court, then when the libraries win, the books will be forgotten and a new battle over different books will be waged. All the while they’re spreading lies about the books, and the libraries, indoctrination and pornographers and so on, so that the communities lose trust in the libraries and librarians, eventually they think they can succeed in completely defunding and eliminating the library system altogether. Education, healthcare, welfare and all the good things about the USA and even modern society are under attack this way.
After years and years of observation, it seems to me that both are required to be either. You must be a snowflake to be a bully and a bully to live as a snowflake.
As my mother used to say, "they can dish it out but they can't take it". Of course, most people don't feel the need to be a bully unless they're extremely insecure.
If you're a kkkonservative xtian GQPer and want to keep foul, vile books out of the hands of children? Start with the bible. The stuff in that hideous tome would scar children for life.
And one of his best characters soundly rejecting it to do the right thing instead.
Wish I could find the Sam Singleton bit about Huck Finn- it was a great little 'sermon'- but that video isn't one of the few still up on his old channel.
*𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘵- It was titled "What a Friend We Have in Huckleberry," if anyone does know where to find it. Bupkis on the youtubes, for me.
It's always disturbed me that in the story of Vcain & Able the brother with the alter gifts of plants has his gift rejected while the brother whose gift is dead animals has his gift accepted & lauded. What's wrong with fruit, grain & veggies other than an animal didn't have o be sacrificed in order to make an offering?
Maybe it's something unique to Missouri, but since when is it in the jurisdiction of the Secretary of State of a state (yes, I know the redundancy of that word is rhetorically awkward, but I'm trying to distinguish from the FEDERAL Secretary of State cabinet position) to oversee public library content/events, anyway?
It's not just about kids reading LGBTQ+ literature. It's never just about the first thing, the first group, the first idea on their target list. It's about kids reading at all; even if there weren't a rainbow to be seen, even if not a single page in a single tome made mention of someone being gay, bi, trans, etc., they'd still find something to raise a moral panic over. Probably something racist, if history is anything to go by (and as determined as they are to repeat it, I'd say it surely is). These censorious fāscíst fücks would just as happily ban libraries altogether.
We need a decisive win in November across the board. People need to be motivated to vote. We need to vote out all incumbent republicans, end new Republican careers, and vote for every progressive democratic candidate we can get. Send a message to all politicians that we expect the government to work for us and not themselves or the corporations and oligarchs. If that doesn’t work, well… what can we do but revolt.
These assholes need to be put in their place, the dustbin of history, and removed from influence over anyone.
They’re picture books and if you can’t bother yourself to read them, then you shouldn’t speak about them, especially if you want to ban them. Are you gonna ban Rainbow Fish because there’s rainbows mentioned? Or books about clowns because they have wigs? Or how about Where’s Waldo, I’m certain both rainbows and wigs are present in pretty much every page of those books.
Let’s not forget that the bible has graphic sex, violence and sexual deviance throughout, but you won’t ever consider that it might not be appropriate for the library. (I believe it does belong in the library, I’m not saying we should ban it, just that it is rife with the crap they claim ought to be banned).
The rainbow is a symbol of God's promise not to kill everything on Earth with water again, therefore a rainbow dinosaur is absurd and anti-biblical and cannot be tolerated.
While the Grinch that Stole Christmas does promote the birth of Jesus Christ our nation's white Lord and Savior, it also encourages tolerance and race mixing, therefore it must also be banned.
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory promotes many wonderful economic stories about capitalism and how industrial accidents only happen to the deserving and are not the fault of the business owner and how seemingly exploitative working conditions are actually GOOD For the workers. However, Willy Wonka's socialist decision to simply GIVE AWAY his chocolate factory is unacceptable and this book must also be banned.
The Very Hungry Caterpillar promotes gluttony and radical unnatural transformations. God made you a caterpillar and this sick transition to a butterfly is abnormal. Banned.
Charlotte's Web: Animals are not sentient. Pigs are food. This negative portrayal of the farm industry as harmful to animals is unacceptable and designed clearly to turn vulnerable children into vegans. Banned.
The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe: Blasphemously portrays our very white and American Lord and Savior as a beast. Banned.
Repubs make the claim "we don't BAN books. We just protect children."
But if a book is no longer available to a child because of unavailability in any public library, that likely means having to pay full-price in a bookstore, if there even is one nearby, and small children don't typically have that sort of money, especially not now.
It's just a means of controlling the narrative before children learn the truth about how very average the average LGBTQ community member is. It can be really hard to hate such normal, regular people when the truth comes out.
Objecting to a kids book about a wig? Wait until they find out about what the founders wore.
I don’t remember at the moment where I read this but it is a brilliant retort to the “almost all the Founders were Christians” nonsense. “Yes, and almost all the Founders wore powdered wigs but that doesn’t mean that our nation was founded on powdered wigs.”
They called themselves WHIGS.
It’s not my fault if they couldn’t spell. YE Olde Englishe
And it so happened that the Whigs became the Republicans!
As Karl Marx said, history repeats itself: the first time as tragedy the second time as farce.
Seriously. Have they ever noticed what's on their dollar bills, quarters, and nickels?
Don't forget that they also wore hosiery.
And needed to work on keeping their calves shapely in them.
and heels
Republicans pander to the preachers while viewing human decency as a character flaw, all of it unencumbered by the thought process. Left up to these politicians America's public libraries would be reduced to the intellectual depth of a Christian bookstore.
The patriarch of my mother's extended family once entered our home (for some reason.)
He was actually offended by walls of books on bookshelves. According to him, there's only need for ONE BOOK in any home. (And as I've mentioned before, our contractor did NOT like our copy of Ambrose Bierce's The Devil's Dictionary.)
I have two rooms whose primary purpose is for books. Plus there are full bookshelves in three other rooms. The one book he would prefer to be the only book in the home? I can lay my hands on at least 7 copies in several translations in two languages within five minutes at home. Along with several books that he would consider demonic. And likely many that would be above his reading level.
Reading is fundamental.
Same here. Unlike these idiots, I actually read the bible, the whole thing, including Apocrypha--three times, in three different English translations, and most of the OT in a Modern Hebrew translation. I've got two of those English translations on my hallway bookshelves now. Plus a whole boatload of kids' books I read to my nephew when he was little. (Yeah, above comprehension level for most of these morons.) I often joke that, if the world goes nuclear, my personal library could contribute to the rebuilding of civilization.
I hope you're right, and something good will remain to build from, Diane.
I can still remember Dad reading the classics to us when we were little.
Thank you for the memory, Dianne. I lost both parents (to age and dementia, at home) during Covid, and I appreciate being reminded of them more than you may realize.
Nice memories. When I was in the hospital, at the age of two, my dad would come visit every day and bring a kids' book to read (sometimes in French, sometimes in English.) I credit him with keeping me sane in the year after getting out of the hospital by reading to me, and for being the first person to realize that, although I wasn't talking (my therapist later called that "traumatic mutism"), I was reading on my own. For all his faults, I miss dad, who died in 2007. Thanks for sharing your memories also.
Like Dan Forester in "Lucifer's Hammer." That was what his hidden book collection literally did.
Thank you! I'll look it up.
My 6th or 7th grade science teacher let me borrow her copy. I should go back and read that one again.
I remember that one! Prepping the right way!
My godson turned 12 on Saturday, the very time I turned 76. I gave him a card filled with advice to guide him for the rest of his life. Number four was: “never stop reading and learning.”
What number was start your day off with coffee?
His dads would not let him have coffee until he’s 18 I’m sure. He’s a bit on the spectrum. Very smart kid. But he’s different. I don’t mind it. I was different too.
I'm so glad that young people are learning early in life.
Had I known things at 10 that I didn't learn until about 60, my life might have been better, or might have been worse.
But it would have had fewer questions, and less self-destruction.
My g/son is 10yo, his parents have always restricted screen time and his free time is nicely filled with other hobbies.....to say he's an avid reader is an understatement. I took him to a vintage motor bike show recently. Owners stood proudly by their vehicles and more than one, pleasantly engaging him in conversation, said things like, 'My, my, it's a long time since I saw a lad your age with a book tucked under his arm, a rare sight indeed.' (G/son was itching to start the new Percy Jackson he'd just been given!)
My godson also is always reading. his dad thinks he reads too much, and he often re-reads books several times.
I”m just happy he’s reading the way I did.
One of the things I loved about owning my own house was that I could finally have all the books I wanted. After about two years, the house was filled with overflowing bookcases. (It wasn't a huge house, but I loved it.)
Joe,
WOW! Kudos, Joe!! Fer shur, reading is FUNdamental!!
I still buy, but read less. (I feel I abandon my principles if I don't check a news feed every 3 minutes.) When I was a kid I can remember reading up to 400 pages "in bed" before rising for the day.
I even have the first 2 volumes of a 3-volume 1823 UK Bible, with dozens of genuine engravings in each (as evidenced by plate marks on the reverse of each.) Estimated value of $5,000. (I paid about $25 at a rural auction. Religion has value!)
Unfortunately, the missing 3rd volume (New Testament) is the only one I have a personal interest in. I really do value the Sermon On the Mount, and I think Jesus meant it as well. It breaks my heart to see Christians(sic) (as I thought of myself as a child) abandon it so thoroughly.
Reminds me one-time of when my MIL came to my house and they saw 2 books "The Devil's Dictionary" and "The Encyclopedia Of Witchcraft & Demonology" and thought they were literal witchcraft or Satanist books, and I asked her why she would think that based on the title and she could literally just open them up and check, before explaining that they are in fact either just informational or slight satire. She felt a bit dumb after that.
I remember a guy I was dating - very briefly, I might add - who walked into my living room, saw my collection of books on women's history, literature, feminism, the occult, history of witchcraft and paganism, etc., and burst out "Good god, you don't actually read all this crap, do you?"
After I recovered from the shock of the blatant uncouth rudeness (you do NOT walk into someone's home and criticize ANYTHING about it. Where I come from, that is Simply. Not. Done.) I replied flatly, "Of course not. They're just for decoration."
The sarcasm in my voice soared over his head like 747. "Oh thank goodness!"
As he was leaving, he added, "I feel sorry for you, living in this dingy little hole."
It was a studio apartment with hardwood floors and 6-foot tall windows. Small, yes, but it was not dingy, it was spotless. And it was most definitely NOT a hole.
This same guy was shocked, SHOCKED the next time he called and I told him I didn't think we were right for each other and I was dating someone else. He kept asking me to explain why. I told him to go read a book and hung up.
That's hilarious. Something similar happens to me, every time someone new comes into my one-bedroom apartment, whether it's the repair guy or friends or family I haven't seen in a while. They look around and the first thing out of their mouth is, "Don't you have anything here except *books*?" Some follow up with "Where's your tv?" My answers are, "No" and "I got rid of it because I'd watched it twice since 2009." Fun to stump 'em, but it does get boring after a while.
I bet it's the Bible, right? The Bible no one for the most part reads entirely, but reads only some passages and verses that suits them and nothing else.
I'm sorely tempted to begin referring to white Christians as "Cherrypickers".
Yes, apparently the only book worth owning is The Bible.
If they weren’t white, they would probably be called cotton pickers.
There was a huge number of white southern sharecroppers, barely surviving from year to year.
Like now, they bought into lies about how necessary slavery, and our Civil War, were. My own southern heritage is composed of exactly such people, with no evidence of slavery anywhere within this county. Yet, to this day, other than my immediate family (now deceased), they are one and all useless, sad and ignorant MAGA.
I can’t say that I actually know any MAGA people. I know a couple of Republicans, and a coupleof the sons of my oldest friend in the world are Republicans. One of them supports Trump, but I’m not even sure about that anymore.
It isn’t a question of politics as I’ve often said. It is a question of values
Offended by books. Wow.
I'd guess that what they find more offensive is the thinking that goes on behind the scenes in a child's mind as they read.
To MAGA, written language (and related images) are like some "secret code" invented specifically to steal children. (We've all heard crazier lately...)
These are the same people who burned entire libraries of books they disagreed with.
Brianna,
I'd guess that the new, Musk-enabled 21-century strategy will be to destroy "Project Gutenberg" as being "anti-capitalist".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Gutenberg
There are some people who only ever learned one thing from books: the flash point of paper.
I can't remember how old I was (9?) when I came across this story (it was in the school library of all places) set in a small American settlement in colonial times, when a young boy was caught reading a book that was not the Bible. He was promptly marched home to his parents by a committee of black-coated town elders who berated his parents about the offense. I don't remember much about it except that one of the things said was "the Good Book is the only book a household needs."
I remember thinking how horridly shitty and awful and boring it would be to live in a place where that was the only book you could own or read.
We also have to remember that they aren't doing this performance for us. They are doing it for their voters and people that are low info within the MAGA bubble. People who also don't read books or won't put any effort in to make sure the information they are getting is in good faith or honest.
So true, PhillyT.
We generally can't know if they're ACTUALLY stupid, or they're simply being performatively so (as it becomes increasingly difficult to "out-stupid" President Stupid.)
You’re not being fair here. I’ll have you know that superficiality in a Christian bookstore runs very deep.
HAR! Thank you! So very cool....
As we all know, "skin is only skin-deep, but thin skin can go on forever."
Man, this shit is exhausting.
That’s the point. The one part of human nature they actually get right is our persistence hunting. We wear our prey out to make it easier to kill. The RWNJs have tapped into that persistence to defeat reasonable people. It is how they got Roe v. Wade, it’s how they keep winning elections despite being responsible for the majority of the problems folks want to fix, and it’s how they are fighting the culture wars. Constant, persistent attacks from every angle, small battles in local government, the middle ground at the states and just the barrage of lies and manipulations from the top brass in federal government. Just to keep the left exhausted, unable to fight every battle, unable to show up in their lives and fight the good fight at the same time.
They know that there is no constitutional way to make these two books illegal, but they will write a law anyway, because they already have the librarians on defense, they can make the law and it will be effective while the library fights it in court, then when the libraries win, the books will be forgotten and a new battle over different books will be waged. All the while they’re spreading lies about the books, and the libraries, indoctrination and pornographers and so on, so that the communities lose trust in the libraries and librarians, eventually they think they can succeed in completely defunding and eliminating the library system altogether. Education, healthcare, welfare and all the good things about the USA and even modern society are under attack this way.
I can't remember ever being so exhausted by trying to do good.
Amazing how bullies can also be snowflakes at the same time.
After years and years of observation, it seems to me that both are required to be either. You must be a snowflake to be a bully and a bully to live as a snowflake.
As my mother used to say, "they can dish it out but they can't take it". Of course, most people don't feel the need to be a bully unless they're extremely insecure.
If you're a kkkonservative xtian GQPer and want to keep foul, vile books out of the hands of children? Start with the bible. The stuff in that hideous tome would scar children for life.
It definitely scarred me.
Mark Twain, too. He wrote about it.
And one of his best characters soundly rejecting it to do the right thing instead.
Wish I could find the Sam Singleton bit about Huck Finn- it was a great little 'sermon'- but that video isn't one of the few still up on his old channel.
*𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘵- It was titled "What a Friend We Have in Huckleberry," if anyone does know where to find it. Bupkis on the youtubes, for me.
On Senator Brattin's page:
"...𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑐𝑢𝑟𝑟𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑙𝑦 𝑟𝑒𝑠𝑖𝑑𝑒𝑠 𝑜𝑛 ℎ𝑖𝑠 40-𝑎𝑐𝑟𝑒 ℎ𝑢𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑎𝑑𝑖𝑠𝑒."
I picture him wandering around his property hunting for a clue.
Hunting paradise (read: kill zone).
Killing animals for sport is obscene. And what happened to Thou Shalt Not Kill?
It's always disturbed me that in the story of Vcain & Able the brother with the alter gifts of plants has his gift rejected while the brother whose gift is dead animals has his gift accepted & lauded. What's wrong with fruit, grain & veggies other than an animal didn't have o be sacrificed in order to make an offering?
He won't find one there. A clue's natural habitat is a library.
Not always true!
Sometimes you find it in the hall, the lounge, the ballroom, the kitchen, the study, the dining room, the conservatory, or the billiard room.
It was Colonel Mustard in the Billiard Room with the Knife. I win!
This made me laugh.
"...hunting for a clue." And utterly failing to find one.
Words are terrifying. ~ Trumpublicans
So is rational thought. It's ever so much easier to blindly believe and never question anything.
Maybe it's something unique to Missouri, but since when is it in the jurisdiction of the Secretary of State of a state (yes, I know the redundancy of that word is rhetorically awkward, but I'm trying to distinguish from the FEDERAL Secretary of State cabinet position) to oversee public library content/events, anyway?
Well he's running for Congress so he needs to amp up his performative nonsense for the MAGA rubes.
Plot twist: actually, the objectionable part was the dinosaur
> "...the ignorant Republican base"
AKA basket of deplorables.
"𝘍𝘪𝘳𝘴𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘤𝘢𝘮𝘦 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦..."
It's not just about kids reading LGBTQ+ literature. It's never just about the first thing, the first group, the first idea on their target list. It's about kids reading at all; even if there weren't a rainbow to be seen, even if not a single page in a single tome made mention of someone being gay, bi, trans, etc., they'd still find something to raise a moral panic over. Probably something racist, if history is anything to go by (and as determined as they are to repeat it, I'd say it surely is). These censorious fāscíst fücks would just as happily ban libraries altogether.
We need a decisive win in November across the board. People need to be motivated to vote. We need to vote out all incumbent republicans, end new Republican careers, and vote for every progressive democratic candidate we can get. Send a message to all politicians that we expect the government to work for us and not themselves or the corporations and oligarchs. If that doesn’t work, well… what can we do but revolt.
These assholes need to be put in their place, the dustbin of history, and removed from influence over anyone.
They’re picture books and if you can’t bother yourself to read them, then you shouldn’t speak about them, especially if you want to ban them. Are you gonna ban Rainbow Fish because there’s rainbows mentioned? Or books about clowns because they have wigs? Or how about Where’s Waldo, I’m certain both rainbows and wigs are present in pretty much every page of those books.
Let’s not forget that the bible has graphic sex, violence and sexual deviance throughout, but you won’t ever consider that it might not be appropriate for the library. (I believe it does belong in the library, I’m not saying we should ban it, just that it is rife with the crap they claim ought to be banned).
Additional Missouri Republican library guidelines:
The rainbow is a symbol of God's promise not to kill everything on Earth with water again, therefore a rainbow dinosaur is absurd and anti-biblical and cannot be tolerated.
While the Grinch that Stole Christmas does promote the birth of Jesus Christ our nation's white Lord and Savior, it also encourages tolerance and race mixing, therefore it must also be banned.
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory promotes many wonderful economic stories about capitalism and how industrial accidents only happen to the deserving and are not the fault of the business owner and how seemingly exploitative working conditions are actually GOOD For the workers. However, Willy Wonka's socialist decision to simply GIVE AWAY his chocolate factory is unacceptable and this book must also be banned.
The Very Hungry Caterpillar promotes gluttony and radical unnatural transformations. God made you a caterpillar and this sick transition to a butterfly is abnormal. Banned.
Charlotte's Web: Animals are not sentient. Pigs are food. This negative portrayal of the farm industry as harmful to animals is unacceptable and designed clearly to turn vulnerable children into vegans. Banned.
The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe: Blasphemously portrays our very white and American Lord and Savior as a beast. Banned.
Further guidelines will follow...
𝐼𝑛 2024, 𝑏𝑦 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑤𝑎𝑦, 𝐵𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑡𝑖𝑛 𝑚𝑎𝑑𝑒 ℎ𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑒𝑠 𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑛 ℎ𝑒 𝑣𝑜𝑡𝑒𝑑 𝑎𝑔𝑎𝑖𝑛𝑠𝑡 𝑎 𝑟𝑎𝑝𝑒 𝑒𝑥𝑐𝑒𝑝𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑡𝑜 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑡𝑎𝑡𝑒’𝑠 𝑎𝑏𝑜𝑟𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑏𝑎𝑛 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑗𝑢𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑓𝑖𝑒𝑑 𝑖𝑡 𝑏𝑦 𝑠𝑎𝑦𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑐𝑎𝑟𝑟𝑦𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑎 𝑟𝑎𝑝𝑖𝑠𝑡’𝑠 𝑏𝑎𝑏𝑦 𝑤𝑎𝑠 𝑎 𝑓𝑜𝑟𝑚 𝑜𝑓 “ℎ𝑒𝑎𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑔” 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑣𝑖𝑐𝑡𝑖𝑚𝑠. 𝐻𝑒’𝑠 𝑎𝑙𝑠𝑜 𝑝𝑟𝑒𝑣𝑖𝑜𝑢𝑠𝑙𝑦 𝑎𝑟𝑔𝑢𝑒𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒’𝑠 𝑎 “𝑑𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑛𝑐𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑏𝑒𝑡𝑤𝑒𝑒𝑛 ℎ𝑜𝑚𝑜𝑠𝑒𝑥𝑢𝑎𝑙𝑖𝑡𝑦 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑗𝑢𝑠𝑡 𝑏𝑒𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑎 ℎ𝑢𝑚𝑎𝑛 𝑏𝑒𝑖𝑛𝑔.”
Of course he sees women as things and gays as less than human. Is his wife OK? Are his children? Perhaps someone needs to check on them.
One wonders if Brattin has had an operation to remove his mirror neurons. It sure looks that way.
I am done with assholes who lack ovaries, empathy, and medical degrees deciding what is "healing" for rape survivors.
Repubs make the claim "we don't BAN books. We just protect children."
But if a book is no longer available to a child because of unavailability in any public library, that likely means having to pay full-price in a bookstore, if there even is one nearby, and small children don't typically have that sort of money, especially not now.
It's just a means of controlling the narrative before children learn the truth about how very average the average LGBTQ community member is. It can be really hard to hate such normal, regular people when the truth comes out.
"We're just protecting the children" said every fascist in history.
Unless I'm mistaken, Brianna, that's the actual name of their handbook.
(Subtitled, (...snicker, snicker, snicker...) )
Eric Schmitt's response to how Blanche handled the Epstein files puts a lie to that claim.
I always thought that Trump's very public admission that he wanted to have sex with his own daughter, Ivanka, whould have had a similar effect.
Except that Trump knew a certain number of men(sic) in America would admire him instead. He was right....
He never read either book because he can't read. 😑 im so fucking over Republicans and their bullshit.